such is the misery of this night
i have a pending summit,
a blog to feed
and test in the morning to write.

there's no use waiting for someone who doesn't know

the other one

sinfully sinister is love outside love
the darkest of temptations
the most forbidden of sins
a whiff of crack
an acid trip
a mistake as simple
as a moral slip
what does it take
for a man to know
he's playing a game
where no one wins.

who be that

who be that
who once was
now trying to figure
what he is
who gazed at stars
from naked rooftops
and chuckled as they blinked

i have no excuses for my madness
except maybe, my dissent
for the illusion that you call reality.

two on two

A wet thatched blanket of furry grey clouds has swept over Bangalore. The cold winter sun is fighting to find a way down, but the best it can manage is a diffused glow – the kind photographers, writers, singers and painters dream to recreate. A perfect holiday for me perhaps to lie back on my couch of solitude and reflect on the strange twist of destiny that made me cross roads with the most wonderful girl I had ever known. It’s been exactly two years to this day since I said the most beautiful words known to man, to the person went on from being my favourite writer to the woman I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. It is two years since that beautiful Diwali night in the hour between darkness and dawn. Three a.m. Neither morning nor night. The evening bustle was now a silence peculiar to Diwali nights. Drops of paraffin indicated a trail of candles that survived their battle with the breeze. Less fortunate ones stood like stubs in balconies and railings across the city. Diyas were now dry, except for a soaked sooty wick. Everything looked spent. Burnt out. Bombay now smelt like Sivakasi on a cold windless night. My favourite friends are the twinkling lights peeping out of windows. They always keep me company as I cherish wakefulness in the dead of the night. Stray fireworks would go off deep into the distant sky followed by a mild thud. It was about a month that we had met. We both knew it since. I just wasn’t brave enough to admit it. Or say it. I still remember the pause after I said “I love you”. It just felt so good to hear myself saying it to somebody for the first time meaning every bit of it. It was such a release. And a start to the most beautiful journey in my life. Magical. Can’t believe that it’s two years already. We lived so much of life in it. Two more years to go. I’ll marry the lady if she agrees to it. I’ll fill up these two years with so much magic that she probably won’t be able to refuse. The next two years will be difficult. We’re miles apart. The MBA would hopefully culminate into a job that’ll let me have the dream wedding in Goa or Shillong. A small, handmade wedding. Handpicked guests with compulsory attendance. That dream keeps me going now. I know this was a mush overdose. But can’t help it. It’s the Bangalore weather. And everyone who has seen this blog from its diaper days is a special someone in the story of my life. So it feels good to celebrate here. With friends. Love to all.

twinkling lights peep out of windows

in a bombay washed in glow

and the way it smells here tonight,

no other city will ever know.

Feels good to be back home for Diwali.